The toilet block at Hank Edwards Reserve was built in the 1960s or 70s and is more than showing its age. While it’s a step up from no public toilets at all, it’s pretty awful to use, smelly, with endlessly leaking or overflowing toilets and with rusting and crumbling parts.
Now the good news: by mid-2022 we should have a clean, safe, fully-functional building with two accessible toilets, a changing room, two outdoor showers and even water fountains for dogs. There will also be a covered area with picnic tables and an electric BBQ.
John Hewitson and Miraz Jordan attended an on-site meeting recently for potential contractors to view the site and discuss the plans with Horowhenua District Council in order to put in bids for the work.
To minimise disruption for the community, work will commence after the busy summer season has finished — around February 2022 and should be completed by about July.
While the toilet block is out of action there will be two Portaloos available for public use. They will be cleaned regularly by Council contractors.
Below are the drawings we’ve been asked to share with the community. These will also soon be posted on the noticeboard.
Note: we’ve clarified with our contact at Horowhenua District Council, Stephan Titze, Parks and Property Project Lead, that although a big green water tank appears in the drawings there will not be a tank but simply a small water connection. BTW: the much-disputed big green firefighting water tank has now been moved to a better location. See Firefighting Water Tank at Hank Edwards Reserve.
The 3 pictures above are simply the individual pages of the G1037 Waikawa Beach Toilets Plan Posters (3.5 MB PDF).
Some additional things we’ve learned from attending meetings about the toilet block:
- A lot of work goes into designing to protect everything from vandalism and graffiti.
- Design incorporates features so no one could climb on the roof and look into the cubicles.
- If you add features such as solar panels or hot-water systems those items are likely to be stolen.
Wow very fancy & wonderful for perdominantly all the dog walking & other visitors to Waikawa Beach! We hate to think how much that is costing the local rate payers and HDC. This money should be spent on developing a decent access through HDC land to the beach especially for our local residents who bought & live here to spend recreational time on the beach & can’t even get down to it unless walking…. not good enough! As far as the fancy BBQ goes…. why would the residents want it? We’re sure most of us have one in our own back yards. Why should our hard earned rates be spent on prettifying up this area for predominately outside visitors!
Usual residence: Waikawa